Tag Archives: President Woodrow Wilson

It could be said that Woodrow Wilson’s ideas are like a work of art. While the artist lived, the world was slow to embrace the art, but after the artist’s death, the world recognized the greatness of the work. Like with a work of art, interpretation would be highly subjective creating great potential for debate and disagreement.

In October 1916, Edward M. “Colonel” House, an American diplomat, stated, “We are part of the world…nothing that concerns the whole world can be indifferent to us.” During the same month, President Wilson stated that the United States would need to “serve the world.”[1] In order to provide this service, Wilson believed that a change in how international relations was conducted would be needed. It was vital that the old system of alliances be replaced by a new system of international cooperation.

Wilson was correct in the need for a new world order, and despite a growing isolationist movement in the United States, there would be no turning back from greater international political involvement. At the end of the Second World War, the United States played a dominant role in the international political body that was created to replace the failed League of Nations. While the United Nations would both be valued and criticized, it would, through accident or plan, become a way for nations to work together in war-torn regions of the world. Conflict and hostility might not have been eradicated through international cooperation, but service to the world’s population through peacekeeping efforts did, in some measure, fulfill the progressive ideas of the early twentieth-century. Certainly, it became harder for any powerful nation to remain indifferent to the concerns of the world.

[1] George C. Herring, From Colony to Superpower: U.S. Foreign Relations Since 1776 (New York: Oxford University Press, 2008), 407.

The United States presents a fascinating study of the various reasons a nation chooses, or feels forced to go to war. In the early days of the nation, war with foreign powers was seen as too entangling to enter into lightly. Attempts to circumvent armed retaliation for foreign oppression resulted in embargoes which hurt the U.S. more than it did those at whom the embargoes were aimed. Military retaliations seldom achieved the sought after goals, although they did establish the clear message that the young nation would not tolerate foreign oppression. International conflict was costly regardless of the strategy, but by the late 1800s a new reality was emerging within the power brokers of the nation. War, while costly in men and machine, could also provide an economic boost to a nation struggling with recession. This reality would become even more pronounced in the 1900s as the machine began to dominate warfare and a race to beat others in the field of war technology intensified. War had become a profitable business even as the world became terrified of the horrible human destruction modern war created. By the mid-1900s, war technology began to threaten the very existence of mankind even while the development of the technology made many powerful and wealthy.

Interestingly, in the early decades of the 1900s men like Woodrow Wilson were well aware of how devastating war could be on the humanity. Having been born in Virginia in the decade prior to the Civil War, Wilson’s earliest memories would have been of war, deprivation, and human suffering. He would have spent his youth seeing war veterans and hearing their stories. He went to school where he studied history and politics, subjects that would have exposed him to the many wars fought over power and possession. He earned a doctorate and would be the first U.S. president to have a PhD. The study of history and politics would have influenced his aversion to going to war, but his belief that the United States could influence others in a positive way would justify his support of intervention and eventually international war. Like many other intellectuals and politicians, his desire to spread the ideologies of democracy and capitalism, in other words, to help others become more like his beloved nation, blinded him to the fact that others might not wish to emulate the United States. As president, he was well on the way to becoming remembered for his military interventions and suppression of revolution before World War I thrust him into the role of international mediator.

Having come to age during the years when the United States attempted to heal from the wounds of war, and having seen firsthand the difficulties created in a society when harsh, punitive treatment was dealt to the defeated, it is not surprising that Wilson would wish to avoid repeating such mistakes when negotiating peace in Europe. It is also not surprising that Wilson would want to find a way to avoid future war. In the end, war is costly and a desire to recoup one’s own expenses at the further detriment of the defeated is hard to suppress. Furthermore, notions of international cooperation can, for many, seem to weaken a nation rather than propel it to greatness. Peace is virtuous, but war promotes power and economic vitality, especially if the war never touches the homeland.

For Further Reading

Boemeke, Manfred F., Gerald D. Feldman, and Elisabeth Glaser, eds. The Treaty of Versailles: A Reassessment after 75 Years. Cambridge University Press, 1998.

Herring, George C. From Colony to Superpower: U.S. Foreign Relations Since 1776. New York: Oxford University Press, 2008.

A term older than World War I but popularized during that war, no man’s land refers to a stretch of land under dispute by warring parties, but it can also refer to lawless areas with little or no governing control. A buffer zone, on the other hand, is an area which provides a sense of protection from the enemy. When physical fortifications offer little protection, buffer zones can provide a perception of security. Nations great and small seek the perception of security when security is elusive. Treaties and alliances are traditional means of creating a sense of security, as is the creation of buffer zones. During the Cold War, the competing nations sought to expand their spheres of influence, thereby creating buffer zones between themselves and their enemies as their spheres grew. When the Cold War ended and the buffer zones were no longer needed, many of the buffer nations found themselves with fewer friends and with fewer resources to prevent lawlessness. These nations found it difficult to avoid the development of no man’s land within their borders.

The United States reasoned, even in the earliest days, that oceans made excellent buffer zones against the conflicts of Europe. Unsettled territories were adequate as buffers but only to a point. While unsettled territories didn’t pose a direct European threat, they were still loosely under the influence of powerful countries. Additionally they often attracted outlaws fleeing justice and smugglers seeking a base of operation near their markets. In 1818, Andrew Jackson decided to pursue a group of raiders into Florida. The problem was that Florida was owned by Spain and Spain had little ability to prevent lawlessness in the territory. When Jackson’s army crossed into Florida, he invaded a foreign nation. Without the consent of Spain, such an action created an international incident. Fortunately Secretary of State John Q. Adams was able to capitalize on Jackson’s actions, and convinced Spain that a treaty was better than a war. His reasoning for defending Jackson’s violation of Spanish sovereignty was that “it is better to err on the side of vigor.”[1] Certainly not the first time a nation chose a declaration of strength as its response to an international crisis of its own making, but possibly the first time such a response became national policy. As Secretary of State, Adams greatly influenced the foreign policy decisions of the president and authored much of what President Monroe presented to Congress. In March 1818, President Monroe declared to Congress that when a nation no longer governed in such a way as to prevent their lawlessness from spilling onto their neighbors, then the neighbors had the right to protect themselves and to seek justice even if it meant violating the sovereignty of another nation.[2] In other words, when an area became no man’s land, it was to the benefit of all nations for the lawlessness to be eliminated by whoever had the strength and will to do so.

Eliminating no man’s land in North America was a task that occupied the United States for more than a century. Eventually, the United States would reach from ocean to ocean and would gain the military might of a great nation. However even as the twentieth century dawned, the United States struggled to bring law to all of its territory. During the century of expansion, some in the United States saw potential in the acquisition of territory in the south, particularly in Central America. Others recognized the difficulty of governing such a vast nation. Faced with lawlessness due to revolt in Mexico during World War I, Wilson authorized the U.S. Army’s invasion of Mexico. However, Wilson recognized the value of having a buffer zone south of the border and eventually withdrew the army. In order to ensure that the southern nations created a friendly buffer zone, the United States supported governments that kept the peace, even though keeping the peace came at the expense of basic human rights. Like many leaders before and since, President Wilson put aside ideology and accepted peace-by-force as being better than lawlessness.

Reflecting on history, some leaders have sought security by building huge empires, some by establishing buffer zones, and others by the targeted elimination of no man’s land. Regardless of the method men and nations have chosen, it is clear that international law, notions of liberty and self-determination, and hope for world peace are always secondary to the goal of eliminating the threat posed by no man’s land.

On the first day of June 1812, President James Madison delivered an address to Congress apprising them of the “injuries and indignities” affecting the nation. American citizens had been “torn away from their country and from everything dear to them” by a nation who had not declared war on the United States, but who was determined to use U.S. citizens as the “melancholy instruments” of war. [1] Nine days later, Congress authorized a declaration of war and Madison asked the nation to be “vigilant and zealous in discharging the duties” which would be asked of them during the perilous years of conflict. Furthermore he asked that they support “all measures which [might] be adopted by the constituted authorities for obtaining a speedy, a just, and an honorable peace.” [2] Drawn into an international conflict, the United States set out to defeat its adversaries and prove that while it was still only a fledgling power, it would not tolerate abuses to its citizens and national interests.

Entangling alliances and international rivalries ignited another war in 1914. U.S. President Woodrow Wilson hoped to avoid being drawn into the chaotic vortex of European war, but like Madison, he recognized that the actions of others might make war inevitable. Certainly the United States could not sit idly by while the safety of its citizens was threatened.

In a conversation with Secretary of Navy Josephus Daniels in 1916, Wilson stated, “I can’t keep the country out of war . . . any little German lieutenant can put us into the war at any time by some calculated outrage.”[3] Wilson, despite running his 1916 presidential campaign on the slogan of “He Kept Us Out of War,” understood the precipice upon which the United States stood.[4]

Earlier in the year, the Mexican rebel leader Pancho Villa had attacked and set ablaze the New Mexican town of Columbus. This attack on U.S. sovereignty, on its own, might not have been the indignity that set the nation on a path to war, but when the Zimmerman Telegram was made public in January 1917, it became clear that Germany planned to utilize the animosity between the United States and Mexico as a tool to weaken the ability of the United States to aid Great Britain and France. Wilson could no longer avoid war and plunged off the precipice. While the sinking of the Lusitania had upset many in the United States, the notion that Germany was plotting with Mexico to seize parts of the Southwest outraged the public. The telegram would be the “outrage” that would propel the nation into war.

A policy of neutrality during a time of European conflict had once again failed to keep the United States out of European warfare. The United States could only ignore a limited amount of national injury, indignity, and outrage before it would strike back.